


hello, my old heart

by craftingdead



Series: charlie will make cd a common tag if it kills them [5]
Category: The Crafting Dead
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-15
Updated: 2018-07-15
Packaged: 2019-06-11 03:48:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15306843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/craftingdead/pseuds/craftingdead
Summary: Nick couldn’t believe what he was doing. He couldn’t fucking believe he was actually doing this.





	hello, my old heart

**Author's Note:**

> im an absolutely horrible person  
> hello my old heart - the oh hellos

Nick couldn’t believe what he was doing. He couldn’t fucking believe he was actually doing this.

But here he was, walking down a long dirt path, snow drifting down around him and softening his steps as Nick made his way towards the large house in front of him. A fire lit in his eyes, and in his arms, tucked in tight with blankets overlapping each other for maximum security, laid a three-month-old. _His_ three-month-old

Jordan was...well, Jordan wasn’t expected. Nick would never call Jordan a mistake—he loved his son with a fierceness Nick didn’t even know he had, but a child certainly wasn’t anything he had been planning for. He and Jesper had been so careful, doing everything they could to ensure that nothing like this could have happened. Jesper knew he was trans, so they added more steps to make sure no problems would arise when they...you know. They had been so careful.

But four months later Nick stared at a positive pregnancy test, watching his life unfold around him.

Nick’s father had been cool with it. He was the one to calm Nick down from his panic attack, holding him and comforting him for the first time in years. It would make sense, seeing as Sky had come from a teen pregnancy as well, that his father was so accepting and so calm about the whole situation. Hell, Dad even said he’d pay for Nick’s abortion if he wanted one. But, after several conversations with friends, family, and doctors, Nick eventually chose his child. He would be keeping it after all.

Jesper’s parents, on the other hand, were not as accepting. They lost their minds when they learned their precious son had knocked someone up. They had made threats, outrageous accusations, and even claimed they’d sue the Cielo-Lynx family if they kept the child! It was the worst case scenario, and Nick couldn’t believe what his life had come to, nor the threats.

But Jesper knew his parents. And he knew that they would rather destroy a family's name than tarnish theirs.

So that’s how Nick ended up in front of a large house, fist resting against the hardwood door as he summoned up the courage to knock. When he finally did—a good minute or two later—an unfamiliar man opened up the door and ushered Nick in.

The moment Nick crossed over the threshold, Rose pounced on the two of them, cooing at Jordan and gasping when he opened up his eyes and looked at her. Bright green, just like Nick’s.

Rose and Jim (the unfamiliar man—Nick learned he was Rose’s husband) were friends of Jesper’s uncle, a kind, older man who had agreed to watch over Jesper after his parents had ended up kicking him out and arranged a meeting between Rose and the two teens. There, they’d come to the conclusion that a few months after birth, Nick and Jesper would bring the child to Rose for her to raise and watch after as an adoptive mother. The deep sadness that had developed in him after the agreement had nearly brought Nick to his knees, but he had to do it. The townsfolk were growing suspicious, and he refused to put this weight on the shoulders of his friends and family.

Jesper was already in the house when Nick arrived. Heavy bags lay underneath his eyes, and he gave him a warm smile, surrounded by papers and files of all types. Adoption files, Nick knew. Fuck, this was really happening, wasn’t it?

“What’s his name?” Rose’s soft voice snaps Nick out of his stupor, and he looks up at her. Pale skin, brown hair, brown eyes. She looks nothing like Jordan with his darker skin and green eyes. She doesn’t look like she should be his parent, but soon she will be, and that tears Nick apart.

“Jordan.”

As Nick passes his son, his fucking _child_ over to Rose, he can feel his life come undone. He can feel the longing, the urge to rip his son back and press him to his chest, to keep Jordan with him and take care of his son the way he should’ve been able to. The way he wants to so badly, but instead, he forces a stiff smile and watches as Rose sways Jordan in her arms and pretends that he isn’t ripping apart at the seams.

Jesper stands up and walks over to Nick, presses a small plushie into Jordan’s arms (a tiger one, something they’d gotten for him the moment Jes had learned Nick was expecting) and together they walk out the door, hand in hand.

“Later, gator,” Jesper says with a sad smile, and Nick laughs. And then he’s gone, disappeared into the snow, to wherever his uncle had set the two up for the time being. And Nick is alone, snow falling around him, soaking into his clothes and body. Nose pink as pieces of his heart drifts away with the snow, flakes falling to the ground and dissolving, never to be seen again.

 

#### ✕✕✕

 

Jordan knew a few things.

One, that he is a six, nearly seven-year-old in the middle of the apocalypse.

Two, Rose and Jim are gone, and possibly AK, too.

And three, the two men standing in front of him, probably both in their early twenties with confused and concerned looks on their faces are his biological parents, somehow.

Jordan had always known he was adopted. AK would always call him innocent and oblivious, but he had always known more than he let on. It wasn’t hard to tell that Jordan wasn’t the “actual” kid of Rose and Jim—his dark skin and green eyes contrast greatly with their lighter skin and dark eyes. He had high cheekbones and a pointy nose, while the faces of both families had generally been softer. He did not look like he could’ve been the son of the two, and people were eager to point it out wherever he went.

But his features looked so similar to these twos, yet Nick and Ghetto (Jordan didn’t believe that was his real name, it didn’t sit right with Jordan, for some reason) claimed that they had never met before, even after he asked if the two knew each other.

However, everything matched up in Jordan’s head. The locations, their appearances, hell, even the ages matched up, if you counted a teenage pregnancy as an option. Jordan knew the shorter of the two was transgender, as AK had explained it when describing the two. Before he had disappeared, of course. So it was likely these two could’ve been his biological parents. He’s heard enough jokes from AK to know what one night stands were, so it was highly possible that he could’ve been the outcome of one of those!

Voices in his head were telling him that it was unlikely, nearly impossible that he just happened upon his biological parents in the middle of the apocalypse. But he prayed they were. The two of them were so nice, and though they teased him and each other constantly, they honestly cared for Jordan. And that made him happy.

 

#### ✕✕✕

 

The more Ghetto thought about it, the worse it got.

Knowing that someone like Red could kidnap a seven-year-old, a child, and hurt them without feeling remorse? It made him absolutely furious—just like discovering Jordan, gagged and shoved behind a counter to avoid detection had made him feel. That kid was practically his son, and Red fucking _hurt him_.

So tonight wasn’t a night for sleeping. Tonight was a night for glaring up at the ceiling and imagining all the things he could’ve done to help him or prevent Red from hurting Jordan in the first place.

Well, that was until the door opened. Ghetto recognized the footsteps instantly.

See, after AK had taken Jordan, Nick and Ghetto had come to an agreement: if one of them was hurting, couldn’t sleep, or was generally just feeling shitty, they could come to the other for help. Whether it was just staying with each other, sleeping in the same bed, or talking about the issue, they could come to each other. It helped a whole lot when Ghetto was feeling guilty about letting Jordan go, and he would be an ass not to help a friend out. So Ghetto scooched over, opening a space up in the bed for him, and there Nick was.

It didn’t take him long to fall asleep after stealing half of Ghetto’s bed. Soon his breathing shallow-ed and his body relaxed and then Nick was asleep. Ghetto didn’t mind, of course. It was honestly nice to have someone else around on nights like this. Especially when it was Nick…

And then, the door opened again.

Squinting against the light that filtered in, Ghetto could vaguely make out the shape of a small seven-year-old decked out in pajamas (it had taken an hour to find ones that fit him properly, but it was worth it) clutching a small tiger plushie in his hands.

Jordan whispered something Ghetto couldn’t make out, and when he gestured for him to say it again, he whispered, “I had a nightmare.”

Ghetto pushed himself back from where he’d unconsciously been drifting closer to Nick, and gestured to the space in the middle, right between the two of them. Soon as he did that, Jordan was over there, sandwiching himself between the soon, being quite considerate of Nick and the fact that he was asleep. Soon, the boy too was asleep and then it was just Ghetto laying in bed awake. Or so he thought.

“Thanks, Dad,” a soft voice whispered from the middle of the bed, muffled by the weight of blankets and the voices plushie. Ghetto stiffened. Then, relaxed. Although he wasn’t the boy's actual father (probably), he could step in to take the place. Jordan needed them now, and Ghetto wasn’t going to let anything happen to him.

 

####  **✕✕✕**

 

Jordan was dead and Nick felt empty.


End file.
